Code Pink Journals CodePINK Journals

Work 4 Peace,Hold All Life Sacred,Eliminate Violence! This is my often neglected blog mostly about my travels across country in my mobile billboard truck as I attempt to engage in dialogue with people in hopes to wake us up and inspire action to change our country and communities and selves. And it is froth with my opinions, insights, analyses toward that end of holding all life sacred, dismantling the empire and eliminating violence while creating the society and life we want

Monday, March 05, 2018

Part II: when your turbo goes and engine runs away:

After you get your turbocharger replaced and the manifold if it has cracked when removing the turbo or if the bolts are sooooo rusty they break off inside the manifold... before you so joyfully drive off, make sure the boys clean out your air cooler and intake hoses/pipes.

I took off Saturday, joyfully, after being stuck for four days, only to drive 2 blocks when the engine once again began it's magical running away! But this time, I knew what to do: popping the clutch, she shut down. Then I started her again and slowly made a u-turn and limped back to the shop, which is now closed.

This Monday morning, I greeted the mechanics with my 'suggestion' they clean out the air cooler.

Begrudgingly, these guys allowed me to tell them what to do - per info from my mechanic & secret informant - & even though they first peer into the air cooler and insist there's only a little dirty oil. But they do proceed to take off air cooler & find tons of oil gathered at the bottom. Looks like I MIGHT get on the road today after all!!!

Sunday, March 04, 2018

El Centro wall....

I know my woo-woo friends are going to claim something woo-woo that I just happened to break down in one of the three targeted places tRump is going forward with building the fuckin wall:

"Customs and Border Protection is taking immediate action in response to the president's executive order. We have identified locations near El Paso, Texas, Tucson, Arizona, and El Centro, California, where we will build a wall in areas where the fence or old brittle landing-mat fencing are no longer effective."

Actually, El Centro is the only place I was NOT planning on stopping at this trip...but now that I'm here, like I found the LGBT Center, I'll find where the protest of this wall is happening - especially if I'm still stuck here Monday.

A young bi-racial Chicana and white womon told me it is outsiders that are protesting the wall, most of the people working here are employed by border control. I asked her why the locals are not against the wall and she said that they are but bad people are coming over the border. I asked her if she thinks a wall will keep bad people out and she says absolutely not.

Saturday, March 03, 2018

My first book 'reading'....to be continued

I'm thrilled I get to present at the event at the LGBT Center. It is housed in a nice building, railroad style with a large entry room followed by a long middle hall with offices on either side to the back room which is a little smaller than the entry room, set up with chairs - in a row, not the lesbian circle chairs - electronic equipment and a large screen.

I'm up first after the director intros the center and evenings program. I rush through things faster than I should, as not only am I asked to talk about my book, but also about lesbian herstory - I'm probably the oldest lesbian there and definitely I've been out the longest.

I identified myself proudly as a radical (I hope!) lesbian feminist, just to get on the right foot, and spoke briefly of our magic, powerful, amazing amazon community that I was fortunate enough to come out into forty years ago! YEAH!!!! I forgot to invite folks to talk to me after if they want to know more.

And then I talked about my book, highlighting that most of us in this country do not know our true history but instead most of us know a lot of myths and propaganda about our history - we don't even know the truth about our present state of affairs, here and in the world.

I asked folks to stand if they have a roof over their heads, food they don't have to eat today, a change of clothes, daily source of clean water -= everyone stood & I talked about those standing are the 15% richest humans on earth. Which Ithen lead into the amerikkkan nitemare - running out of time, I recounted the salmon story.

No one felt inspired to buy my book...tearz but I did give one copy away to one of the two Black people there, a gay man.

LAMBDA from San Diego was the featured speakers who presented a slide show. I almost felt like I did when we gathered together to listen to bush give his state of the union and we counted how many times he said certain words. I listened carefully for the "L" word or even the Dyke word - but those words seemed to come from my mouth only. Even when talking about the aids crisis and 'women' came out to help their 'brothers', not lesbians. 8000 gay men have died of AIDS since 1982 but no mention of how many womyn have died from breast cancer since 1982.

Queer of course was probably mentioned as much as trans though. I had to point out, when one of the gay white male presenters recalled the victory over tRump's attempt to ban trans people from the military, that we are engaged in the longest war off this continent and the state department wants anyone who is willing to murder other people.

I plugged the Bay Area Lesbian Archives for Lenn and the rest of us. Of course, no mention of the controversy, exclusion, of lesbians from the archives, although they did touch on the lack of Black representation -which is why we are creating our own archives.

Practicing my 'run away engine' skills...

I'm thrilled when Fed Ex pulls up right on time 10:00 this morning, giving my mechanic his two hours needed to install the turbocharger and the manifold before clocking out of work at noon.

I watch him, practicing my spanish as we talk about family and traveling while he works. His father has a shop across the border in Mexicali and he's worked in his dad's shop since he was 15.

When he's all finished tightening bolts and attaching hoses, I turn the engine over. She purrrrrrs! I pull her into the bay for steam cleaning and off we go!

About two blocks...this time, when the engine starts to 'run away' I know exactly what to do. I turn on the ignition which doesn't put a dent into the revving up nor the smoke that's beginning to pour out the tail pipe. I try first unsuccessfully to pop the clutch in 5th gear. Changing to 4th gear, I pop the clutch and the engine dies. I'm so fuckin relieved.

I restart the truck, make a u-turn and head back to the yard where the astonished workers are wiping their hands, dropping their greasy scrubs, and looking forward to leaving for the day, I'm sure.

But I make it back without my truck sounding too bad, minimal but still too much smoke, and no more running away.

But I'm not running anywhere either. I'm informed that no one can work on my truck now until Monday - so I have to settle for waiting...

I walk to the LGBT center by way of the coffee house as I'm very early.

Friday, March 02, 2018

Activists El Centro style!

Looks like I’ll be stuck here until tomorrow at least – the
good news is that I’ll be able to speak at the LGBT center, 15 minutes! The bad
news is that some of the bolts broke off when they tried to remove the old
turbocharger plus the manifold cracked. Which just doubled my bill…plus my time
here.

At least I’m still in California, although barely. They will
overnite the manifold, install both the turbocharger and manifold tomorrow,
hopefully in time for me to drive to the center. Everything has to be finished
by noon anyway, cause that’s when the shop closes on Saturday.

To save a few dollars, I walk to the O’Reillys auto place to
buy oil and a filter. A young round-faced cheerful young man behind the counter
searches for my filter and then looks at me with alarm in his eyes as he says “wow,
that one’s expensive”. I agree – my mechanic has already informed me, $50 if
they provide, $46 if I get at Reillys.

When I set my Kombucha water bottle on the counter to find
my VIN, he comments on the Kombucha, which leads us into a long conversation
about the environment and growing organic, Standing Rock and protesting the
border wall.

It is such a pleasure to have this conversation with a
worker at Reilly’s – not the usual but this appears to be a brown-male-run shop,
not usual either.

I ask him how he got to be so active and aware and he
attributes this path to following his older brother, who lives on and is the
caretaker for land in the country and grows organic food and animals.

Thursday, March 01, 2018

White people

Leaving the LGBT center I walk the additional mile to the
State Street Coffee House – a cute, little bungalow sitting back from the road,
converted into a coffee shop. There are no lesbians or at least no one who
admits to being a lesbian inside but there are more white people than I’ve seen
since I’ve arrived here.

A slight older white womon with a full head of long white
hair braided on either side of her ears, smiles shyly and tells me she agrees
with “Death to Racism”. We talk a little and when Tina hears that El Paso and
Texas are in my travel plans she confesses she hasn’t driven through Texas
since she and her best friend took a greyhound from Charleston to San Diego. She
starts describing one of the scheduled stops the bus made along the way in
Texas. When the passengers disembarked and entered the building, there was a
little, very dark, dank and dirty small walled-off porch area to their right
with one Black man sitting there, his back to them, hunched over his plate.

The bus driver pointed the passengers through another
doorway to the sunny, cheery formica tables with matching chairs perched on top
of shiny dark brown wooden floors. Behind the counter, a couple white women in
red, white and blue uniform skirts and blouses, broad smiles plastered across
red lips, motioned for them to sit.

Tina looks directly into my eyes, anger and resentment
filling her face, as she expresses her irritation … at the bus driver. I’m
taken back and ask her why would she be angry with the bus driver – and since
1982? She declares that he should have taken them somewhere else, that he knew
he’d have to sit in the darkened section while they went to the white side. She
resented him exposing this reality of the u.s. to her.

“Where did you expect the bus driver to take you in Texas in
1982?” I ask, curious. I see it dawn on her, for the first time in 35 years,
that maybe that’s what all the restaurants in Texas were like. Startled, she
asks me if it is still the same in Texas today.

I ask her what did she, her friend, and the other white
passengers do? She looks at me blankly. “Did you support racism and sit in the ‘whites
only’ part? Or did you think about joining the bus driver and other man sitting
on the porch?”

“Why, no. We weren’t allowed to do that,” she states unequivocally.

“Really?” I ask skeptically as she blushes slightly. I could
see I made my point. I acknowledge her anger and ask her, rhetorically I hoped,
why did she think she turned her anger on to the Black person who was the
victim of racism and not on the white perpetrators? Why was she willing to comply
with and add to racism instead of challenging the white waitresses and owner,
the other white passengers, her friend?

I told her about the sunset or sundown towns, where Black
and brown people had to be out of that town by sunset – or be targets of white
violence, legal white violence with impunity.

My first reading...maybe

I’m delighted to find there’s an LGBT center in this tiny
California Imperial Valley town! I walk the 1.5 miles from the repair shop to
explore the center.

There is a solid womon with sparkling brown eyes, thick
black curly hair tied back behind her ears, sitting behind the desk welcoming
me and offering me water. The walk over has been hot and I’ve forgotten my
water bottle. She pulls out a plastic water bottle that ignore.

She takes great pride in telling me their largest group is
the trans group that will meet tomorrow, and that they have drug abuse and
anger management groups as well. I ask her about any groups for lesbians and
she waves nonchalantly as if to say, ‘oh those…insignificant’. “I’m sure
there’s lesbians around” she states confidently, “but there is no need to have
any groups. We’re not exclusive, we include everyone.”

Okay, then why the trans group?

I stare at her in disbelief. Then I ask her, “okay, where
will I find lesbians here?”

She admits she doesn’t know & I wonder if she’s as
lesbian as she looks. So I change tactics and ask about lesbian-owned businesses or
bookstores or bars even. She gently, as if I’m deranged, denies the existence
of such “L” identified places.

Then she tells me, a chuckle in her voice, that maybe I
should try this coffee shop. I like coffee shops, especially if they serve
organic coffee.

Another womon, solemn and serious, thick black hair curving almost to her shoulders, formerly thick eyebrows plucked to thin lines, formal dark blue skirt suit, strides into the reception area somewhere from
behind closed doors. She extends her hand and warmly welcomes me, apologizing for
being busy when I arrived. I tell her no worries and answer her question as to
how I found them and where I’m from.

And this is the truth: I searched in google maps for the
YMCA and the LGBT center came up, much to my surprise. No Y but this center.
She tells me they’ve been here for almost 3 years and they’re for everyone, not
just the LGBT community.

She also brags fondly about their trans group when I
ask her about a lesbian support group. She eems to also think there isn’t a need, that
lesbians are all over and come to use the services there, but the center is not
blatant, not like – and she searches to hastily cover up whoever she was going
to point the finger at, probably remembering I come from one of those ‘blatant’
places, so I assure her, nodding so convincingly she nods with me: “blatant
like heterosexuals, you mean”.

Her business-like veneer slips a little but then she quickly
tells me about the event they’re having Saturday and invites me to come and
speak for 15 minutes if I want to. And do I want to! She has examined my book,
skipping right to the “to do” pages in the back, nodding her head, agreeing
with the list, at least of the first 10 things.

The things to know….if your turbo goes!

Driving from San Diego heading to Tucson on I-8, I had
climbed up and over the tallest of the spectacular desert mountains that nestle
majestically between California and Mexico, and was on the downhill from 4000
feet, when I heard a series of loud quick clangs like someone was using a
crowbar to knock on my metal door and then a high whine that could have been a fan
belt squeak or the high scream of metal-on-metal.

Ut oh, I knew I was in trouble. I pulled off the freeway
at the first sign of people, very sparse people, with an open chevron gas
station and an abandoned café on the south side of the freeway, and a handful
of trailers and tiny dwellings on the west side.

The young womon behind the counter confirms with a kind sympathetic
smile there are no mechanics in her town, so I move my truck over to the huge, sandy and
gravel lot, sporting one abandoned and listing rv, to begin to google diesel
mechanics.

Of course, there are none close by. My options seem to be
get towed back over the mountains to San Diego which might cost a grand…hahaha…or
get towed 26 miles to the next town for $250.

Or try to keep driving. After all, the engine is running,
the brakes work, the oil and water levels are fine, all fan belts are strong
and accounted for, it shifts like it’s supposed to. It’s just making that
strange, unidentifiable noise that escalates in unison with the gas pedal.

In hindsight I probably should have just camped there
overnight in the empty lot, did more research, and made the decision in the
morning. I don’t know why I didn’t seriously consider that.

Instead I took off, trying to make it to the one shop that I
found 25 miles east, that claimed to know how to work on Isuzu NPR diesels! The owner had
warned me that I might lose power down to 45 or 50 but I assured him I don’t
normally go over 55 anyway.

He did NOT warn me that my truck might “runaway”. Nor did
he tell me what to do if it does. Now I know.

IF your engine will not shut off when you turn off the
ignition, cut the fuel source, disconnect the batteries -= in other words, if
it keeps mysteriously running, spewing huge clouds of black and white smoke, and deafeningly revs up like
it’s about to levitate, you’re supposed to throw the vehicle into 4th
or 5th gear and pop the clutch. I don’t know what automatics do,
sorry.

Popping the clutch will shut down the engine and prevent
damage done when the engine finally burns through lubricants and runs dry – and
shuts down that way.

I don’t know yet if my engine has been damaged or if the
culprit is just the turbocharger – and the manifold.

Wednesday, February 28, 2018

LGBT Center Imperial Valley! Who nu?

So guess what? Here I am, sitting on the side of the highway, waiting on a
tow truck that can handle my truck and haul me the final 5.8 miles to a diesel mechanic - crossing fingers! This is the mechanic who told me I could probably drive 25 miles from Ocotillo, where I first stopped in horror, knowing my truck was making a terrible, probably very expensive, noise.

I got 20 miles, no problem, but suddenly I heard a crash, and black and white smoke started billowing out of the tail pipe like scalding milk bubbling and overflowing a pan on high heat. The first tow truck that came attempted to haul my truck up upon a flatbed tow truck. I was like, "are you gonna make it under any overpasses" to his certain assurance. Yet the front wheels of his truck elevated as he tried to return the flatbed and my truck onto his truck. No way.

So now while I'm waiting another couple hours ,I decided to google ymca as it looks
like I'll most likely be stuck here for a few - & guess what came up? Nearest Y is
53 miles away but 1.4 miles from the repair shop is the LGBT center of
the Imperial Valley!

So that's where I'll be in the a.m.!!! Maybe my
first reading will be in El Centro instead of Jackson!

Stalled under the full moon!

Full desert moon! & I'm broken down, waiting for the tow truck to haul me six more miles and $120 to El Centro, CA in the Imperial Valley.

Turbo blew,
& the engine revved up to a zillion mph even tho I shut it off &
pulled off the highway! I felt like the truck came to life & didn't
need me to start the engine - the engine wouldn't shut off!

It was making sooooooo much smoke, so loud, so screeching, the minimal traffic on this
desert stretch actually backed up and slowed to a crawl. I was expecting it to rise up off the ground in a few seconds.
Minutes later, before the smoke cleared or the engine finally died, highway
patrol officers jumped out w/a fire extinguisher & the fire
department sent three guys w/axes, hoses, & hats!

But Miguel was 1st
on the scene, pulling his royal blue fancy car to the right and a few feet ahead of the truck, jumping out and proceeding to help: trying to disconnect the batteries, close off the fuel
lines, detach the spark plugs - nothing worked!

Twilight zone.... but
then the engine did die apparently running out of motor oil it was
burning.

Friday, February 23, 2018

But What Can I Do!!!!!!

MY BOOK! MY BOOK! MY BOOK!!!!

It's finafuckinly in print! I'm SOOOOO excited! I wanna do a reading in your neck of the woods!

My book is called "But What Can I Do? A handbook for change: My Self, My
Community, My Country". I'm hoping it will be a meaningful and inspiring
contribution to dismantling patriarchy, racism, war, misogyny and to
creating the kind of society we want to thrive in!

I'll be on the road soon (like Monday!), heading to Southern CA, then
Tucson, El Paso, Shreveport, Jackson, Alabama, Atlanta, West Palm Beach
- and then I'll land in D.C. for the anti-gun action March 24th. If ur
along my beaten path, or anywhere really, u can email me at
ButWhatCanIDo2018 at gmail!

TOGETHER we WILL change this country
to what it has never been! A just and kind society void of racism,
sexism, patriarchy, war, white and male violence!!! RISE WOMYN RISE!

About Me

i'm now a 67, almost 68 (who am I kidding almost fuckin 70!!!) yr old (still with a golden age pass to get into national parks FREE) jewish lesbian anti-racist mother - and grandmother - striving radical womonist/feminist; daughter & granddaughter of survivors of the holocaust, mother of a young amazon healer & amazing human being, lover of wimmin & student of conscious living............even tho i am the one actually driving the truck, i could not even head out from home if it were not for the support of many, many, many wimmin (and several men as well). i am now working on trying to publish my book "But What Can I Do? A Handbook for change: myself, my community, my country. I still continue to offer Racism Awareness workshops geared for White people, NO DRONES workshops, and any other that is needed. if you want to help support this journey, email me!